Boyfriending 101
by sakanascales876
Summary: Mamoru shattered Usagi's heart, leaving her friends to pick up the pieces. Now, the Senshi want to know why. Dreams be darned, Cape Boy isn't getting off so easily this time, and now he's going to have to learn that the hard way. Set in R season breakup.


This is what I'm posting this weekend instead of my weekly drabble. When I wrote this, it was originally  
going to be a drabble, but then I figured that six thousand words may have been a little over the limit ;)  
Though I was slightly disappointed by the lack of response from the last drabble I posted, I hope you enjoy  
this story! I'm going to be posting something much bigger next weekend!

This is dedicated to shana elmsford, who requested that I write this. D's crying now, and he sure as hell  
deserved it! I hope you like it, and I enjoy getting feedback from you!

**This story is in the R breakup season, and is rated T due to some swearing.**

Thank you, and enjoy!

* * *

Boyfriending101

By sakanascales876

One-shot

* * *

Mamoru's mind slowly began to function again, each minute passing by like an engine heating up before ignition. When he had finally regained enough of his senses to open his eyes however, he _did not_ like what he was seeing.

His hands and feet were bound by chains to the school desk he was unceremoniously dumped into, with silver duct tape covering his mouth and wrapped tightly around his chest and the chair.

Never before had he gotten drunk, but if this was what a hangover felt like, Mamoru was turned off of alcohol for life.

He couldn't see it, but he felt the warm trail of blood creeping down the side of his hair and down his neck, pulsing painfully in synch with the giant knot on his head which he had deduced was why he had been knocked out. For had he been awake, none of the crap that was currently going down would have run so smoothly.

But the moment he looked up and saw Sailor Venus sitting at the teacher's desk before him with an iniquitous look in her eyes, innocently drumming her nails on the wooden table top, he took those words back as quickly as he inhaled air.

"Oh look," she said, a little too cheerfully. "Cape Boy has finally decided to join us!"

She stopped her drumming and leant forward on her elbows, as if to tell Mamoru a secret.

"Do you know why you're here?" she whispered, gray-blue eyes unsuccessfully rummaging through his own.

Mamoru didn't say anything…if he knew why he was there then he probably wouldn't be bleeding from the side of his head at the moment.

She sighed theatrically, her trademark pout taking control of her features and guiding her back into the chair, legs crossed over the table, hands relaxed behind her head.

"Well, Mamoru," she said airily, waving her pearly gloved hand nonchalantly around her head as though waving to an invisible crowd. "I would personally like to welcome you to the first, and hopefully for you, the _last_ meeting, congregation, etc. of the new class we've just started."

Class? What the hell kind of class could the Sailor Senshi be running?

Mamoru shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "Umm…Minako-san, why didn't you just ask me about it rather than---,"

"Sneaking into your apartment at midnight, bashing you in the head with a table lamp, and dragging your sorry carcass down here? That would have been much less---_messier_. But had we not done it this way, you wouldn't have agreed to come."

He blinked. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could sense tiny icicles spiraling their way down his spine.

"What exactly do you mean by---_we?_" Mamoru asked quietly.

She unfurled her hands from behind her head and made shooing notions toward him. "You've got two eyes, buddy! Turn around!"

With effort, he managed to painfully crane his neck backwards a little bit, only to jump about a foot out of his skin.

Sailor Mercury stood over his shoulder, one hand pressed to the back of his neck. He could feel the sheet of ice that splayed along the expanse of his back, noting that this was probably why his entire being had felt so frozen.

Forcing the irritation out of his voice, Mamoru closed his eyes tightly and grit his teeth together. "What the _hell_ is going on?"

Venus began to clap wildly. "That's exactly what's going on! What's the expression they use? _Bingo!_ Way to go, Smarty!"

He frowned, opening his mouth to reply when someone beat him to it.

"Shut up, Chiba," a fiery voice said from the back corner of the room, and though he couldn't see it, he presumed it belonged to Mars.

There was a slamming of a door, and a twist of a lock. Mamoru gulped as though the only key was being shoved down his throat.

Mars made her way over to the front desk, sparks flying from the tips of her heels as they clacked against the tile. When she reached them, she pulled up the chair from the desk beside him, turned it around, and sat down so the back of the chair was pressed against her abdomen and her arms were hugging the back rest.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Jupiter materialize on the other side of him in a flurry of wind and electricity, and the lights momentarily flickered, but he didn't dare to remove his gaze from the violet eyes of the fire Senshi.

"What do you guys want?" he asked, his voice smooth and firm. Inside however, his stomach was quivering like one of those American Chihuahua's. Normally he wouldn't have been afraid, but considering the four of them had him cornered, tied, and in a secluded area, this was not the case.

Minako sighed dreamily and glanced at the ceiling longingly. "I really want a boyfriend…"

Jupiter sniggered. "Not happening, sister."

"Nobody asked you!"

Mercury's hand tightened considerably on his shoulder. "Mamoru-san," she said in her disturbingly quiet voice. "We just brought you here to talk to you."

Mars snorted. "Don't let him off easy, Mercury. I intend to slowly beat the shit out of him until he wishes that he wasn't even born in his past life."

Jupiter's mouth formed an O as her shoulders slowly shook from laughter.

From his side, he saw Venus's chair squeal as she pushed it backwards, stood up, and slammed her hands on the desk, drawing forth everyone's attention.

"Well, Chiba Mamoru…welcome to 'Ass-Kicking 101,' where you will not only learn how to be a good boyfriend, but you will apply it towards a certain someone who shall not be named."

If Mamoru could've stood in outrage and started chewing her head off, he would've.

"What the hell? You guys can't---,"

"For the last time!" Mars roared, her fingers drawn together at gunpoint with flames dancing wickedly across her fingertips. "Chiba! _Shut. Up!_"

He did, but he glared at Mars with a fire that could easily compete with her own.

"You have _no right_," he spat.

Venus frowned at him. "As her protectors and her friends, we have every right."

His fists clenched together so tightly that the wood of the desk began to crunch and curl beneath his fingers, the wood molding into the shape of his fist.

"So tell us," she began in an uncharacteristically calm tone, walking around the front of the teacher's desk with robotic legs. "Why did you find it necessary to take _our best friend's_ heart and trample and tear it into so many pieces that not even _moi,_ the _goddess __of __Love__, _could put it back together?"

Mamoru frowned furiously and averted his eyes towards Jupiter's feet, which he soon learned was a big mistake, for she put a strong finger beneath his chin and tilted his face up to meet her lethal eyes.

"Answer the damn question, Mamoru. Although I would love to help splatter your guts across the wall right now, I am _not_ in the mood to have to clean it up before Haruna-sensei comes in here in the morning."

He locked his teeth together, refusing no matter what they did to tell them the real answer…how the dreams were…he shook his head and boldly looked Jupiter in the face, grunting as her fist collided with his stomach.

"Try that again, Cape Boy, I dare you," she threatened. "In case you still haven't noticed: you're the one tied up and we're the ones holding you here. The sooner you cooperate the faster we can all go home and get some shut eye."

Resiliently, he turned to look Venus in the eye. "What do you want?"

She sighed and placed her hands against the cool top of the desk, leaning forward toward his face. "We want to know why you broke her heart."

He lowered his head, long bangs falling over his face and over the eyes that had been deprived of sleep. He could never tell them of the nightmares…they would call him stupid and say that he was being paranoid, but they didn't _know_ what it was like to watch someone they held dear die repeatedly in their dreams every night and then see them in the day, smiling and happily unknowing of the horrid fate that could be waiting for them.

Why couldn't whoever was in charge just leave Usagi and him alone?

"Things just didn't work out," he lied slowly.

"That's a load of bull-poopie and we both know it."

Jupiter turned her eyes toward Venus, a smile playing on her lips. "I'm sorry…but _bull-poopie_?"

Venus blinked. "What? Would you prefer that I say bull shi---,"

"No!" Mercury cut in, hands releasing Mamoru's shoulders and already half way up to covering her ears. "Bull---er---poopie is quite alright."

Venus reeled back and blew a stray hair from her face. "If we're done, I'd like to continue."

Mars waved and rolled her arm as if introducing royalty. "The floor is yours."

Blue eyes turned on Mamoru with a more serious note. "Mamoru-san, we both know what you just said was a load of…bull-poopie. If I may say so myself, you two were the happiest couple in the world, and Usagi-chan is the sweetest girl in the world, so I don't really see why things weren't working out. You guys made goo-goo eyes everywhere you went…to the park---,"

Jupiter rolled her eyes. "The movies."

Mars began to count off on her fingers. "Your apartment."

"The grocery store."

Jupiter looked up at her in bewilderment. "The grocery store? Mercury, when the hell did you see those two---,"

"I was getting some head ache medicine for my mom!" she protested, holding up her arms in defense.

Makoto clicked her tongue. "Right."

Mamoru, however, was not liking where this conversation was heading. "Okay, when on Earth did you find time to follow Usa—_gi_ and I around?"

His fingernails were clenched, his breath was a bit labored, and he was sure his eyebrow was twitching a little bit.

"Don't look at us," Mars said dryly, looking to her nails even though it was covered with the pallid white glove. "Minako-chan's the one that stalks other couples when she can't even snag a boyfriend herself."

Twinkles of light appeared dangerously close to Venus's hand, and the next thing they knew, she was hurling her sword towards Mars's head, the Senshi barely dodging it in time.

"Dammit, Venus!" she hollered, her hand delicately placed at the top of her head which had nearly been scalped.

"If you crack one more joke about me, Mars, I swear…" she threatened, waving a glowing finger dangerously around.

Mars began to vehemently protest when Venus slammed her hand on the table, the thud echoing through the nearly empty room.

"I want silence in this room, understood?" she bellowed.

Mars scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Oh, so now after all this time you decide to---,"

"That was an order from your leader, Hino. I said _silence_."

Jupiter stopped her silent mirth, Mercury clasped Mamoru's shoulders even tighter, and Mar's face turned a strange pink, eyes glaring but masking muted shame.

Venus then proceeded to dig through her sub-space pocket, frowning in concentration until she finally pulled out a manila folder and tossing it onto the table.

"What is this?" he asked somewhat hesitantly.

"Cause and effect. I know you've studied this before, Chiba," she grunted, pointing haphazardly towards the envelope. Picking it up, she began to slip through it like a cartoon strip. He received brief glances of what he was pretty sure were pictures of Usagi. Doing what? He didn't know, because in the next minute, Venus had snatched them away and was pulling one out, placing it carefully in front of him.

It was definitely his Usagi; sweet, happy, and emitting bubbly energy to anyone around her. Her cheeks were rosy, and her eyes alight with happiness and the sky in which they were colored.

He felt his throat hitch.

"Why are you showing me this?"

"Well, dearest Mamoru-san. This so happens to be a picture of Usagi-chan six months ago, when we were all blissfully unaware of your existence, and the Dark Kingdom was still mobilizing their forces."

Reaching back into the folder, Venus fumbled to the very last page and plucked the very last picture from the end, replacing the other with it.

The knot on his head began to painfully pulse in time with his erratically beating heart, and he didn't even care that it hurt him anymore. He was glad it did. He deserved it.

The picture in front of him was definitely Usagi, except it was taken from the view of her balcony, where she was lying miserably on the bed, her hair in a wad of tangles and knots and her eyes swollen from crying, the dark circles beneath them looking even more irregular due to what he guessed was lack of sleep. Her eyes were lifeless; her pale skin and limp body making it even more convincing that she may have been dead.

Mamoru felt like shaking her, demanding what was wrong, even though he could tell what was, for it equally hurt as bad for him as it did for her, except the effects were starting to become a bit more visible on her than they were on him.

The only thing he could manage to say, albeit weakly, was, "When was this taken?"

Venus didn't move, but continued to stare at him expectantly, her eyes beginning to curl in accusation. "Last night."

He looked down at the floor, his eyes refusing to meet theirs or the pictures.

"Last night," she continued, tapping her fingers impatiently against the desk. "When she _was aware_ of your existence, and is still suffering the side effects of it."

He said nothing.

"Chiba, you may think I am, but I am no fool. There is a reason that you keep doing this."

His eyes gradually crept up along the side of the wall until they met hers again. "What am I doing?"

"Being a jack-ass that needs to accept his feelings and move on."

If he could, he wanted to reach up and tug out his hair until he was completely bald. That was _not_ the reason why…he had accepted that he loved her _long_ ago, and he cherished that. The last thing he was was a jack-ass! He was protecting her from _death_, Dammit!

"I have accepted them long ago," he growled, his fist curling into the wooden arm rests of the desk once more. He pitied the kid that had to sit there the next day, for it looked like it had been tossed in a wood chipper and whatever pieces that had been salvaged were glued back together.

"Then tell us why you turned our best friend into a lifeless sloth who just crawls through every day, trying to make it to the next!" Jupiter roared.

"I can't tell you!" he spat, directing his words to Venus more than the rest of them.

"She's our best friend," Mars warned. "We will beat the living _shit_ out of you if you don't tell us."

He shook his head, closing his eyes and trying to shut his mind of for a moment to gather himself before he began to tell them everything…that would turn into a disaster.

"I'm done with your crap, Chiba!" Jupiter bellowed, standing from her chair. The lights in the room began to flicker hazardously and wind began to throw papers across the room.

He had always noticed a golden rod protrude from Jupiter's tiara whenever she conducted electricity or attacked, and he blinked when two drumstick sized golden rods appeared in her hands, both of them showing tiny currents of electricity running up and down each other.

She raised them up into the air, and with as much strength as she could muster, she thrust them down right above him.

The only thing he felt after that was the rods going straight through his hands and even lodging themselves within the desk.

His teeth chattered as he leant over with pain, not noticing the look of shock on the other Senshi's faces, who stared at Jupiter who was shaking with anger.

Shocked was an understatement. Mercury nearly leapt back when his shoulders had flinched from the impact.

"Now you had better tell us why the hell you're being such a bastard or the next thing I throw at you will end up in your forehead!" she spat.

Reaching down, she tightly wrapped her hands around the tops of the rods and twisted them around in his hands, satisfied when blood began to trickled down his fingers and mixing with his moan of pain.

"Jupiter!" Mars yelled. "What the hell?"

She grunted, taking her place back at the desk beside him and shrugging. "Your method wasn't working…let's see the outcome of this."

Mars pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. "You don't just---Agh!"

She buried her head in her hands and continued to shake it back and forth, mumbling the entire time about how she was surrounded by idiots.

Mamoru however, was currently deciding whether or not he should just rip out his hands and get over the pain, or rip Jupiter's throat out for causing it.

Oh wait, he'd need his _hands_ to do that. Dammit.

Frustrated tears began to fall down his cheeks, and it wasn't even from the pain in his hands. It was from everything; he didn't want Usagi to cry, and he certainly didn't want things to come down to _this_. But he _had_ to do it, and he'd continue to protect her until the nightmares stopped, if they ever did.

Venus, who seemed to gain some sympathy for him, reached out and awkwardly grasped his shoulder, giving it a war squeeze that only made him hiss.

"I-I didn't want things to go that far, Mamoru-san. I just want you to tell me. Everything…this…it will all be over if you just tell me what's the problem and why you did it."

Mamoru looked up at her and glared, the hatred he had harbored for years directing and unleashing itself on her. He didn't want this destiny, and he didn't want to deal with any of them. He just wanted Usagi, and her alone. If she was with him then eternity had never seemed so bad in his mind.

But apparently, that wasn't the case anymore.

"I fell in love with somebody else," he lied, cursing himself in his mind for his own stupidity.

He looked to Mars whose eyes seemed to disintegrate to ashes like burning wood. If she managed to get into his head, he was done for. He could even feel her pushing and probing at his mind, and he understood why. If she really believed that his feelings had changed over a millennia, then this would rip her heart out just as fast as Usagi's. After all, they were best friends, no matter how many times he had heard the priestess fervidly deny it.

Venus blinked, a dumbfounded look melting into her features and she stared dumbly at the wall behind him, a haunted look in her eyes. Without even looking at him, she reached down and grabbed the lightning rod jutting from his bloody hand and twisted it.

His fingers curled, and he barely managed to withhold his moan of pain. White flashes were coming more frequently to him, and he was sure that if any of them did that again, he would pass out.

"Who. Is. _She_?" Venus said in the most silent voice that had ever been emitted from Aino Minako.

He didn't answer. He knew he couldn't just make up a name…he needed _proof_.

Within the domain of his mind, he felt Mars reach out and nudge his foot with her high heel.

"Hey," she grunted. "If you're going to lie, at least have enough information to make someone up before you do it."

She gave him that triumphant look of hers that almost looked like she was glaring at him. She usually did, but this time it was annoying.

Ready to throw insults at her that would knock her two years into the future, Mamoru cringed when he felt Mercury gently squeeze his shoulder.

"Mamoru-san?" he heard Mercury say quietly from behind him. "I sense that there is a much deeper problem here. If there's nothing wrong with her, then there has to be something wrong with you. Are you…okay?"

Jupiter looked at him from the corners of her eyes and commented coolly, "When has he ever been okay?"

Vowing to make Jupiter pay when he got out of the chair, Mamoru cursed Mercury for her utter brilliance.

"Everything's fine Mercury," he muttered, staring down at his hands which were still bleeding, although it was sluggish. The wound from his head was pulsing in synch with the ones in his hands, giving him an extreme migraine.

"Are you sure?" she inquired calmly. "Are you sick? You seem to know something that we don't know and I believe that it would be in Usagi-chan's best interest if you told us."

He stared resolutely at the white board behind Venus. "I think it would be in her best interest that she didn't."

She leaned over his shoulder and looked him in the eye. "And why do you say that?"

This was exactly what he didn't want to talk about. He couldn't talk about it, especially not to them when they would jump so quickly to call him paranoid and stupid when he knew he wasn't. Fidgeting uncomfortably in his chair, Mamoru shook his head.

"It would be dangerous for her."

Jupiter sniggered. "What, have you all of a sudden become some kind of drug dealer or something?"

"Just leave it alone!" he roared, making everybody but Mars and Venus visibly jump, but from the vibrations he was feeling from where they were standing, he knew they did.

Venus, once again irritated slammed her hands down on the table and got in his face. "No, we will not leave this alone, Dammit! Chiba Mamoru, I want to know what's so important to keep from her that you would have to break her heart for, and I want to know _now_."

He clenched his fists, and despite his position in the current food chain, began to shout at her. "I'm not afraid of you, Venus! What I know is information that belongs solely to me and me alone. I'm doing this to protect her and nothing you say or do is going to change my mind. So get out of my face, let me out of this God damn chair, and get out of my life, because this is between her and I, and it's absolutely _none_ of your business whether I continue to see her or not!"

"Then you watch her sob on her bed every single night!" Venus cried, red veins visible in her neck. "You watch her eat out everything in her refrigerator because she's so fucking depressed that she can't think of any other way to spend her time! And you can listen to her wishing that she had just died in a battle so she wouldn't have to deal with the pain she's going through now, and _then,_ and only _then _can you tell me that it's not my business anymore!"

They stared at each other fiercely for what must have been over ten minutes. Around halfway through, Mamoru could feel his eyes start to mist over from tears of everything she had just said, and he could see it in Venus too. This was nuts, and the way they were at it, it wasn't going to be getting better anytime soon.

Venus said something almost inaudibly, but just loud enough so he could hear it. "It's our job to protect her, Dammit. Just tell us what's going on. She doesn't have to know right now…just tell us so we can at least try to know what exactly we're up against."

"You're not up against anything. This problem concerns me and me alone," he said firmly.

"Mamoru!" she groaned, lifting her arms up and rubbing the side of her temples. "This is exactly where we were five freaking minutes ago. Just listen. It's our job to protect her as the princess, and more importantly, as a friend. I know that you understand that. I will guarantee that we will not tell her and leave that decision to you, no matter what it is. Just tell me why you're doing this to her so we can deal with it and get on with our lives."

Mamoru, tired, bleeding, in pain, was sorely tempted. They were going to call him every single type of stupid that was in the dictionary, and would probably tear him a new one, but now, he just didn't care. He was going to stay away from Usagi if it killed him, and it already was.

Taking a deep breath, he looked painfully at Venus. "You _cannot_ tell her. I mean, this is as serious to me as it would be if the world found out who we really were."

Venus nodded. Not too quickly, but definitely reliable. "You have our word, right everybody?"

It took a minute or two, but he finally heard the rest of them grunt in reluctant agreement.

"It's…I've been---well a long time ago I---,"

"Tah-tah-tah-today, buddy!" Jupiter mocked.

He glared at her before looking back to Venus. Of everyone he hated in the world right now, it was Jupiter. If he kept his eyes on Venus however, then maybe it would be easy to say. She was loyal, and he knew that she would listen to him all the way through.

"There have been dreams," he began, his hands beginning to tremble. "But first, I want you to listen to me. Every single dream I've ever had has come true. _Every. Single. Last. One._ When I was eight, I had a dream that a friend I grew up with at the orphanage with, Fumio, would get hit by a car. One month later, he did, and now has a textbook case of paralysis. When I was fourteen, I had a dream that I was taking a geometry test, and one week later, the same test I had seen was in front of me. I got a perfect score because I had already had the answers memorized. And you already know the story about the princess asking for the Ginzushou."

Venus nodded.

"And after that," he continued. "Around a month and a half ago, I got this nightmare. Usagi and I…well, we were getting married---,"

Venus, despite herself, pumped her fist in the air. "Score!"

He paused, inhaling a weak breath. "And then she died."

The only sound in the room was the hum of the overhead lights. Venus, Mars, and from what he could tell, Mercury, were all staring at him, fingers clenching and unclenching, slight gasps, and tightening hands.

It was silent for what seemed like an eternity, like they actually had enough time to repeat their pasts again.

Mamoru finally decided to speak. "So you see why---,"

"No, I really don't," Mars spat. "It's just a dream…you're ruining her over a dream!"

Mamoru sighed. This was exactly what he had been afraid of…they didn't understand, and anything he said wasn't going to sway them either.

Mars glared pushpins at him. "And you didn't even think of telling us this! Mamoru, you idiot! Why do you always let your damn pride and ego get in the way of everything?"

Before he could respond, Venus calmly raised her leg and kicked the desk backwards, Mercury flinching away with a squeal, and Mamoru grunting as hid head was bashed against the tile.

"How dare you!" she roared, hands raised with treacherous flashes of yellow light discharging from them. "How could you even think of not telling us this? She's our best friend, our princess, Mamoru! Didn't it even occur to you that this may be the work of the new enemy at hand? Did it cross through your inflated head that if you told us then we have a huge chance of saving her!"

She zoomed at him, and he felt the crack of his jaw as she punched him in the face. Blood began to lethargically run down his chin and onto his clothes, and his hands screamed in agony as his entire body jerked back in shock.

Painful tears formed in Mamoru's eyes, and he glowered at all of them. "You didn't let me finish!" he hollered, managing to somehow get the chair back on its feet. "They told me that if I didn't stay away from her that she would die!"

"Who did?"

"The guy in the nightmare!"

"So that's it then?" Venus roared. "You took it upon yourself to break her heart instead of just telling her the truth and awaiting the reaction? Chiba Mamoru, you no good, dirty, rotten, son of a bitch! She thinks that you _hate_ her, that you don't _love_ her anymore! You treat her worse now than you used to when you first met her!"

How dare he? How dare _she_? How dare she accuse him of not loving Usagi anymore! That was the only reason why he was insisting upon this in the first place!

"I get it."

The room paused as though a storm of police had just run in the room and pointed their guns at the elusive Senshi. All of them turned to Jupiter, who was looking Mamoru in the eye with something akin to empathy. He stared at her, expecting her to accuse him, punch him…he didn't care anymore. Anything she did to him couldn't even compare to the pain he was feeling both physically and emotionally right now.

Jupiter's eyes looked down as though they were ashamed. "I don't know about you guys, but I think that it's actually a very good reason."

Venus stared at Jupiter in outrage. "Are you actually condoning everything he's done to Usagi-chan? He's just going to keep hurting her---,"

"If it's to protect her, then yes."

She stared at Mamoru with eyes that were knifing into his mind. "You are doing this to protect her, right?"

When he nodded, she turned to Mars. "I get it. He's got a feeling. While it sounds stupid and completely irrelevant, don't you get feelings like that, too? Mars, you get premonitions all the time and they turn out to be right."

She turned to Venus. "You've got a killer instinct of when the enemy's nearby or when we need to get the hell out of dodge, so why should he be any different. Mercury, I can't really say anything about you because you're just a freaking genius, but I get the feelings too, like I know when a storm is going to happen before---,"

"Way to take the place of a _weatherman_, Jupiter," Mars spat.

Jupiter stood up, pounding her fists. "I mean it, pyro! We should be taking this just as seriously as he is, and even though there are many moments when I hate his guts, I'm going to stand by him this time."

Something swelled within Mamoru's chest, and in his mind, he had just forgiven Jupiter for everything she had just done to him.

Venus sighed, the fatigue and weariness finally catching up on her at such early hours of the morning. "Mamoru-san, of everything you could have done, did you really have to break her heart like that and treat her like dirt?"

The softness of her tone relaxed him, but guilt travelled into the pit of his stomach and rented a room.

"It was the only thing I could think of," he croaked. "She's so stubborn…I don't think I could have kept her away by telling her anything else."

Jupiter nodded firmly. "Although I hate the thought of you being around her in the first place, I think that this way is for the best."

He nodded, and without warning, Venus reached down and grabbed the rods and twisted them again, making him howl in pain. He slumped over in his chair, taking ragged breaths and looking her madly in the eye.

"That was for making her cry. I can't say that I like this, but if you're going to keep on doing this, then you're going to have to be nicer to her. _I mean it_."

Against his will, he found himself nodding, something that only Mars must have been able to do. She must have been at her cracking point also.

And the next thing he knew, Jupiter, Mars, and Mercury silently filed out of the room, leaving him alone with Venus.

She was shaking her head back and forth angrily. "So this is your wonderful solution? Push her away until she's out of sight, out of mind? Way to fucking go, Kamen. You probably just ruined everything you had with her."

She regarded him disgustedly, as though he wasn't even human. "I guess I'm going to have to give a D…plus. You're going to have to try harder to bring that up, Chiba. Class dismissed."

She evaporated from the room, leaving him alone in the now dark classroom, the sanctuary of books never seeming so ominous before.

Once he knew that they were gone, he curled over in his chair and wept, something he had not done since he received the news that the parents he didn't remember had died. This was too much for him…he didn't know how long he could keep up this façade of having to hate her right in front of her face. He didn't want to do it anymore, but he had to.

He was horrible, disgusting, cruel, and he hated himself for it.

The tears turned into sobs, making him feel as though he had knife twisting itself around in his heart.

After a few minutes, the chains evaporated from his wrists, along with the duct tape, but that left him to pull his hands all the way up and out of the lightning rods, gasping in pain every inch they crept up. Once they were off, he numbly tried to clench them into fists, but to no avail. His fingers wouldn't even move.

When he was finally free he was standing, bleeding, numbing, and almost entirely insane, tears streaming down his face like rapids.

On wobbly knees he stood and took the rooftops home, guilt and pain dogging his every step.

* * *

"Mamoru-san!" Usagi called weakly into the apartment. "I'm here to drop off Chibi-usa-chan!"

The pink haired child crossed her hands over her chest and glared up at her 'cousin'.

"I could have come alone," she huffed.

The blonde put her hands on her hips, holding up her pointer finger and saying, "I was just making sure that you got here safe. See if I ever do _that_ again."

Chibi-usa smirked. "You only came to see Mamo-chan."

Usagi glared down at her. "Shut it, twerp. I walked you over here so those freaks didn't come after you if you started crying again."

Chibi-usa rolled her eyes, slinging her backpack from her shoulders and putting on the pair of slippers that always rested near the front door for her.

Usagi seemed to teeter at the entrance.

"Usagi-san," Mamoru nodded curtly, walking from the kitchen. "Thanks for dropping her off."

Even though she knew it didn't mean anything, her heart thumped faster. "It was no problem."

Looking at the clock, she slowly began to back up towards the door. "Well, I don't want to be a problem, so I guess I'll just go…"

"Nonsense. I just made some hot chocolate," he said softly.

She frowned, wondering why all of a sudden he was being so nice to her. Why did he always have to be so nice? Tears formed at the corners of her eyes, but she quickly shook them away. If she was ever going to win him back, she had to be strong. Not the wimpy cry baby that he thought she was. She would become smarter, more graceful, anything it took to have him by her side again.

Little did she know, he already was.

"Okay," she muttered, setting her school bag down. "I do have a little time left before I have to get to school."

"You mean until you're late to school," he teased, setting down a steaming cup in front of her.

She blushed, but then saw his hands. They were mummified with bloddy bandages, and she stood, taking his hands into hers and looking him worriedly in the eye.

"Mamoru-san!" she gasped. "What did you do?"

Cautiously, he looked down and blinked, not knowing what to say.

"I—er…I, uh, had a little accident with the roses, you see…"

* * *

With a sigh, Umino slowly walked into the classroom, pulling out his pad of paper with all of the week's gossip on it, slowly crossing old news off the list.

Dropping his bag, he gasped. "What the heck happened to my desk?"

* * *

I just had to put Umino in there...God I love that nerd. I really hoped that you enjoyed it! And I'll be posting  
something a bit bigger next weekend, so watch out for it!

I especially hoped that you liked it, shana, and I think that D got what he deserved...for now anyways!  
Who knows? Maybe he'll actually pull his act together and treat Usagi right! Or maybe there will be a  
part two...

REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

-Fishyscales876


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